[Bug]: emacs fails to install under ubuntu:26.04 proot installation

[richardxday]

Problem description

Disclaimer: I'm assuming this is an issue with proot/termux rather than the ubuntu emacs package as I'm sure it would have been fixed by the package maintainer if it was!

After installing the ubuntu 26.04 proot installation, it is not possible to install the emacs package (which installs emacs-gtk by default).

The process fails due to an error:
>>Error occurred processing /usr/share/emacs/site-lisp/debian-startup.el: File is missing (("Doing chmod" "No such file or directory" "/usr/share/emacs/site-lisp/debian-startup.elcEIkh7p"))

The file that is claimed to not exist does exist in the directory (see below) but is zero bytes long.

Phone is Samsung S25 Ultra.

What steps will reproduce the bug?

2026-08-15 15:57:00 [0] u0_a405@localhost:~
$ proot-distro login ubuntu
root@localhost:~# cat /etc/lsb-release
DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=26.04
DISTRIB_CODENAME=resolute
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu 26.04 LTS"
root@localhost:~# apt install emacs-gtk
emacs-gtk is already the newest version (1:30.2+1-2ubuntu1).
emacs-gtk set to manually installed.
Summary:
Upgrading: 0, Installing: 0, Removing: 0, Not Upgrading: 0
2 not fully installed or removed.
Space needed: 0 B / 255 GB available

Continue? [Y/n] y
Setting up emacs-gtk (1:30.2+1-2ubuntu1) ...
Install emacsen-common for emacs
emacsen-common: Handling install of emacsen flavor emacs
>>Error occurred processing /usr/share/emacs/site-lisp/debian-startup.el: File is missing (("Doing chmod" "No such file or directory" "/usr/share/emacs/site-lisp/debian-startup.elcEIkh7p"))
ERROR: install script from emacsen-common package failed
dpkg: error processing package emacs-gtk (--configure):
old emacs-gtk package postinst maintainer script subprocess failed with exit status 2
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of emacs:
emacs depends on emacs-gtk (>= 1:30.1) | emacs-pgtk (>= 1:30.1) | emacs-lucid (>= 1:30.1) | emacs-nox (>= 1:30.1); however:
Package emacs-gtk is not configured yet.
Package emacs-pgtk is not installed.
Package emacs-lucid is not installed.
Package emacs-nox is not installed.

dpkg: error processing package emacs (--configure):
dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
No apport report written because the error message indicates its a followup error from a previous failure.
Errors were encountered while processing:
emacs-gtk
emacs
Error: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
root@localhost:~# ls -l /usr/share/emacs/site-lisp/
total 7
lrwxrwxrwx+1 root root 38 Aug 15 14:57 debian-startup.el -> ../../emacsen-common/debian-startup.el
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 14:36 debian-startup.elc5Faaqt
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 14:57 debian-startup.elcEIkh7p
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 14:36 debian-startup.elcEJtV0k
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 14:36 debian-startup.elcP9DgZf
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 13:44 debian-startup.elcRdiSGa
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 14:46 debian-startup.elcT3DY1O
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 14:38 debian-startup.elcjDVMgZ
-rw-------+1 root root 0 Aug 15 14:37 debian-startup.elcwrKCFb
drwxr-xr-x+2 root root 3452 Aug 15 13:40 llvm-21
-rw-r--r--+1 root root 106 Nov 22 2025 subdirs.el
root@localhost:~#

Note that the file referred to (debian-startup.elcEIkh7p) does exist but is zero bytes long.

What is the expected behavior?

That the package installs without error.

Android OS version

Android 16

Kernel information (uname -a)

Linux localhost 6.17.0-PRoot-Distro #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Fri, 10 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 aarch64 GNU/Linux

PRoot-Distro version

PRoot-Distro version '5.6.0' by Termux (@sylirre).

PRoot version

5.1.107.90

Termux application version

Termux version 0.119.0-beta.3 installed via F-Droid